“You’re damn right I am.”
I look at him in horror. “We’re at my graduation!” Shoot me. Please. In the face.
“I don’t give a flying fuck where we’re at! You better not be a whore, Tyson!”
Oh boy. Here we go. Here’s the Bear I know. “Please tell me you’ve lost your mind. It’s the only rational explanation that would make sense for the words coming out of your mouth.”
He looks at me for the first time since we started speaking and his eyes go wide. “Have you?” he demands.
“Why, of course, Bear! Just last week I got to have a twelve-way with the varsity wrestling team. Boy, do they know how to pile-drive, I’ll tell you what!”
“I… you… I swear to God, Tyson….”
“You asked me if I’ve had sex! I tell you I’m gay and that’s the first thing you want to know? You need to go back to therapy. I’ll call Eddie. Clearly, you have some unresolved issues.”
“I… kill….”
I know his brain is already misfiring. Prepare for an Epic Bear Tirade In T-minus three.
“Not while I’m alive… I….”
Two.
“Dental dams… fifteen years old… over my dead….”
One.
“When I was your age… holy fuck….”
Ignition.
“You’d better have another thought coming! You know what could happen to you? Jesus Christ, Kid! It starts that way, sure. Oh, hey! Look! That guy’s giving me the come-fuck-me-eyes! That’s how it starts! He’ll introduce himself as something ridiculous, like Gustavo Tiberius, because everyone has idiotic names these days, and he’ll say it in a generic Bond villain accent that you’ll swoon over. Then he’ll wine and dine you and take you to some absurd-sounding French restaurant that charges eight dollars for a glass of water that you didn’t even want, and afterwards, he’ll ask you if you want to go to his place, and sure enough, you’ll think that’s a great idea. He’ll mention he lives in the middle of the woods, and you’ll still go because you think sex is cool and you totally want to get laid. You’ll get to his house and see that he collects clown china dolls and has a picture of Jesus hanging on the cross with his mother’s face superimposed over Jesus’, and he’ll ask you if you want something to drink. You’ll say yes, but it will taste funny because it’s full of date rape, and you’ll wake up tied down onto a department-store mannequin that also has his mother’s face on it, and Gustavo Fucking Tiberius will ask you if you like to be spanked, because his mother likes it, and I won’t have it, Tyson James Thompson! You hear me? I won’t have you spanked like his mannequin mother! You will stay a virgin for the rest of your life, so help me God, or I will make sure you are locked in the Green Monstrosity until you take your last breath! Do not fuck with me on this, you hear me? Gustavo won’t get his hands on you!” By the end, he’s shouting, and I’m pretty sure everyone within a four-mile radius heard the entire diatribe. This is why more gay teenagers don’t come out to their parents: they don’t want to know anything about mannequin date rape. Or whatever he said. Gross.
“Gustavo Tiberius?” I ask him incredulously. “Give me some credit here. I’d at least wait until the second date before I put out for someone named Gustavo Tiberius. I do have some standards, after all.”
“Not funny, Tyson,” he growls at me.
“You said it, not me. Don’t blame me for your crazy.”
“I’m not crazy!” I can see the panic in his eyes. I may have underestimated how much today would weigh on him. I really was only thinking about me. Goddammit. Tends to freak out, that one, in case you didn’t know. Needs to be handled with Kid gloves.
“I’m gay,” I tell him quietly.
He takes a shuddering breath. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
I looked at a shirtless picture of Gerard Butler once and got a boner, but I don’t think I should say that out loud. Not to Bear, at least. “How did you know?”
“Fuck,” he mutters. “And you haven’t….”
“No, Bear. I haven’t.” I bet no other graduate here is being asked by their parents if they’ve had gay sex. God, adults are so embarrassing.
“Is it me?”
“Is what you?”